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Sunday, September 6, 2015

Tranquil Air - 2

I sat on the edge of my little self-imposed limbo, my feet dangling off into the void, and contemplated how very peaceful things were. No one could reach me here.

I'm confident, to this day, that it was my own power that brought me to this place. Of course I had made enemies. But no one, in the entirety of my world, had the power to do - this.

Except me.

Gravity is an arbitrary force here. I was pinned to the ground, my normal means of flight lost to me. However - the ground itself was a few yards of dirt floating in a void.

Idly, I combed my fingers through the grass. To my surprise, I found a rock. I dug a bit deeper, ripping away the foliage, and an entire cube of dirt pulled loose from the ground.

A cube, not a pile.

That was my first discovery. Whatever this world was, it was not the same as my own.

It seemed that this world was - compressed, somehow. Things were condensed down to their basic essences, such that I held a chunk of dirt, now no larger than my hand. I focused, and the dirt became even smaller, enough that it could fit in a pocket, with room for more. Setting the dirt down, I focused again, and it grew back to its original size - but no larger.

I broke the dirt once more - and this time, a large creature appeared in its place. Startled, I shoved the thing away, and it fell off into the void.

So, now my island was one "block" smaller.

Thus ended my first day. I watched the sun set beyond some distant horizon, and without really meaning to, I slept.

For the first time in years, I fell into true sleep, instead of some meditative trance. Perhaps I should have worried more about falling off into the void, but I was tired, and the sound of running water soothed me.

When I woke, I realized that such a sound could only mean one thing: I had water.

I looked down to confirm this. Flowing out of the side of my island was a seemingly inexhaustible waterfall. I dug into the island, always wary that another -creature - would appear, and found the source.

Like everything else in this world, it felt somewhat - blocky. But although it was refreshing to drink from, I couldn't scoop more than a double handful out at a time, and at the core of this source block, I could sense some kind of raw life. I'd need something that could capture the essence of this 'creature' to really have any effect here.

Part of me wanted - for science alone - to put a block of dirt into the water, to see if the dirt could obliterate that core when it returned to full size.

The rational side of me reasoned that I'd need this water to survive, and so I didn't try that.

Instead, I drank my fill, and turned my attention to what I could do here.